


melt me down

by naimeria



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Here There Be Emotions, Other, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Wakanda, and introspection
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-18
Updated: 2016-08-26
Packaged: 2018-08-09 14:30:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7805458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/naimeria/pseuds/naimeria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony can’t help but rake shaking knuckles over his chest, the nervous tap-tap-tap tick almost extinct from having nothing to tap, and he remembers, like he did the night the shield slammed straight through the cavity to crush and gouge, how it felt to have Obadiah pluck it out of his chest, eyes whispering checkmate as he left Tony gasping in his wake. </p><p>How it didn’t feel very different at all, how he forgot for a split second that the reactor powering his suit didn’t still power his heart, and for one sick moment he wondered if Steve had forgotten, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He reads the letter again, again, again, through the crinkles in the paper, the smudges from long gone hands. The scrawl is maddening in it’s consistency, like this is a casual update and not something that makes Tony want to pick up a bottle and drink till he drops. 

This isn’t too drastic thinking for him. Once maybe, but the spaces at his sides echoing louder than the words in his hands, The Avengers will always be yours, and he thinks of the word Family and remembers the way Steve said Home, looking down at the base Tony had built for him, for them, for his family. 

He thinks of Pepper, running a company that still has his name plastered on it, undeserving of his baggage. He thinks of Rhodey, that palatable pride as he walks on his own, aided by the tech Tony built with his own two hands, reparations for the destruction those hands had a part in causing.

(No, that’s not quite right. He doesn’t mean to eliminate Rhodey’s choice from the equation, because he had a right to choose, and the words turn to Steve’s, dammit dammit dammit)

He thinks a lot about Barnes. About James, Bucky, the Soldier, the man controlled by other people’s fear, the man that instilled that same fear, the man whose own fear still shone bright in his eyes, paired with a weary resignation and a guilt that Tony himself is all too familiar. Head rested against the cool wall behind him and he can’t get those eyes out of his head, can’t keep his fist from shaking, crumpling the letter further still. 

Barnes didn’t deserve it. The logical side knows that. But Tony hears her singing her sad song, gentle fingers once more on light piano keys, and he thinks how much he misses his mom. It’s a hot burning ache, a fierce thing that lives right under the churlish reactor scars, and he knows, okay, that Barnes takes no joy in the death he’s wrought. It doesn’t help. 

(He’s lying.)

The phone still sits on the desk upstairs, three week’s worth of dust settling easily atop it. Tony hasn’t thought about it in over a week, but he thinks about it now. Now, when he’s wrist deep in the boot that still bears the scars of the shield, the repulsor casing that’s cracked and dark and dead. It’s almost the last of the Bleeding Edge that needs repair, the garish chest reactor left for the very end. 

It’s shameless avoidance. Can’t help but rake shaking knuckles over his chest, the nervous tap-tap-tap tick almost extinct from having nothing to tap, and he remembers, like he did the night the shield slammed straight through the cavity to crush and gouge, how it felt to have Obadiah pluck it out of his chest, eyes whispering checkmate as he left Tony gasping in his wake. How it didn’t feel very different at all, how he forgot for a split second that the reactor powering his suit didn’t still power his heart, and for one sick moment he wondered if Steve had forgotten, too. 

But no. Steve’s a good man. Chasing his ideals, digging himself a deeper and deeper grave, bringing everyone with him to ruin to save his own morals. 

Tony gets it, he does. Steve clinging to choice with bloody fingers, because it’s almost always taken from him. Then, in turn, he has to get why Tony, the futurist, has to reach for options. Because he wishes he could follow Steve and his simple thinking, the naive and beautiful ideal of staying pure and separate from outside control. 

It sounds perfect. Tony knows better. 

Compromise and adapt. (One hand on the steering wheel, she’d said, but where is she now? Still steering underground, or is she with Steve too? Had it been a lie, or had it been the opposite: a rare glimpse of honesty?) He wants, he wants things to work, and it’s not something born of guilt, it’s born of something more raw. Wants to see this team last, wants it to be sustainable, wants them to have a long life, wants them happy. Wants them alive. 

Peace in our time. 

Tony stands so suddenly the bench wobbles, and he goes, putting on nice shoes and a nice blazer and his hands do not shake. The Mark 43 stands along the west wall, FRIDAY activating it without being asked, and putting it on feels a lot like the period at the end of a long sentence. 

He sets the coordinates for Wakanda.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from bastille's _fake it._


	2. Chapter 2

As expected, there’s resistance. 

He sticks the landing through a dense fog, only after passing through three checkpoints and two beautifully aerodynamic vessels that almost succeed in shutting down the suit’s flight systems. He has to insist four separate times that he is here for a private matter that lies outside of the UN’s consideration, and twice more that he is only here to talk. Their King, he supposes, is ultimately why they relent, and why he’s currently on a landing pad and not fending off a small army. 

An olive branch.

It’s like nothing he’s seen before, beautiful reaching buildings in the midst of dense foliage, curling green around rigid white, and Tony takes a moment to notice it while he tries to remember how to breathe properly. 

He doesn’t know if Steve’s here, not really. This is where both of them should be, though, it makes the most sense.  
“Mister Stark.” 

Tony comes to attention at the address, turning to T’Challa and giving a nod. “Your majesty,” he says, with no mocking, and the faceplate rises to show the shadows under his eyes and the twitch of his lips and the not-quite-healed bruises. “Thanks for letting me in.”

“Do not make me regret it.” He looks wary in a calm way, body set to move if need be, but not itching for a movement. What it must be like, to stand at the ready and not feel like you’re about to come apart? 

“That’s the plan,” he says, walking forward as T’Challa turns to lead Tony inside. 

The building slash palace is as stunning inside as it is out, functionality and luxury marrying perfectly in designs Tony’s never seen before. There are guards at most of the doorways, and they all turn their gazes towards him as they pass, nodding in respect to their King and merely watching Tony. 

They come to a large common area, minimal furniture and one wall comprised entirely of glass. They both stare out at the encompassing landscape, and T’Challa breaks the silence. “Why are you here, Mister Stark?” 

He won’t waste the energy it takes to ask to be called Tony. “Didn’t seem like the kind of talk to have over a flip phone,” he says, then realizes out of context it might be a weak excuse. The look he receives affirms the suspicion. “I just wanna talk. To Steve, not really to Barnes, if that has anyone’s pantsuit in a bunch.”

“The concern lies in the events of Siberia.” 

He has the childish urge to flip the faceplate down, to not have to hide the flinch, to clench his teeth and shut his eyes against the I watched him kill my mom flicker across his ruddy cheeks. But he doesn’t, because foreign soil and foreign dignitaries and he actually really does respect T’Challa. “I’m here to talk. Wouldn’t have come otherwise.” 

“I believe you. As I said, do not make me regret it.” 

Tony waits, because he can take this pause, can accept this form of lower ground. Waits and waits and stews and wheedles his way onto their security channel, faceplate down only as the prince leaves. It takes two minutes for him to find Barnes. He doesn’t expect what he finds. 

“Tony.” 

Steve's there, because of course he is, body half blocking the containment unit, looking surprised and unalarmed. Tony ignores the gut fight-or-flight that sets his teeth on edge. He won't give Steve that power over him again.

“He’s back on ice,” is the first thing Tony says, faceplate coming back up, and the surprise is tangible. Steve’s brows raise, because clearly it’s not what he expects, which is completely fair, because Tony didn’t expect it either. Didn’t expect to be so bothered. 

“It was his choice.” Steve’s tone is thickly layered, and at the top is wariness. Tony wants to snort, wants to shake him, wants to yell you think I don’t know how important that is to you? Do you think I don’t know you at all?

“The HYDRA conditioning?” His tone is clipped, gaze darting around the room, because Steve’s piercing gaze keeps bringing him back to the feeling of the shield thudding into his reactor, watching the energy bleed and flicker across scratched paint.

“Yeah. Said he couldn’t trust his own mind.” 

The silence is awkward, penetrating. Steve doesn’t shift, because soldiers don’t shift, but Tony does. “Did you get my package?” Steve asks, and Tony’s face does something, he couldn’t tell you what, but it has Steve’s brow furrowing in response. 

“Yeah,” Tony says. The silence is a noose. 

“Listen, Tony,” Steve starts, tone pacifying and shoulders straight, and Tony wants to hit him all over again, but he won’t. Doesn’t mean he won’t fight tooth and claw.

“No,” armored fists clench at his side, then tactfully unclench, teeth sharp around the word. The armor gives him the height he needs to not be physically demeaned, and he looks Steve straight in the face. You listen. “You sent a note and a phone. Call if you need help.” I needed help years ago; I needed help when Obadiah tried twice to end the boy he helped raise. I needed help when I thought your best friend killed mine, when my fear was manufactured and used as a weapon. When your ghost took my father from me. 

It’s hard to not hold this against the man flinching in front of him. 

“It’s hard to wrap my head around that,” he says, teeth tasting like acid, but he keeps going, because they’ll eat him up if he doesn’t, “when I asked you to help in the Accords and you-” 

Tony breaks off at that, a wordless noise chuffing past his teeth, and Steve’s face says all he probably will say in the next breath. I couldn’t surrender my ideals, Tony. What the Accords stood for was wrong. I’m sorry we were on opposing sides, but not enough to buckle. 

“This isn’t what I came here for,” Tony says, before Steve can say any of it. “I know he needs help.” He points to Barnes, the same man who dug his fingers into his reactor casing. The same man who Tony beat bloody. 

“And you want to help? Tony, you tried to-” and now it’s Steve’s turn to let poison hang in the air between them, unable to bring to life the words that will exist between them for the rest of their lives. 

“I know, I was there.” It doesn’t have the bite Tony wanted. He just sounds tired. He doesn’t offer reasons or excuses, ask for forgiveness or redemption. 

We’re all broken men, Steve. 

“I meant what I said. There are teams of people that can help him.”

Steve’s arms are crossed over his chest. He doesn’t look stern or confrontational, he just looks steadfast, a picture of derision. “This was his choice. I won’t take that from him.” 

“It’s not really a choice if he doesn’t know all of his options.” It comes out nasty, and Tony doesn’t have it in him to regret it at all. “Hell, does he even have a date when he wants to wake up, or is he your John Spartan to be defrosted when it suits you? You just gonna stay in Wakanda forever, watching him sit while you do the same? Hiding from the world?” 

“I thought you didn’t come for a fight, Tony,” Steve says. 

Tony narrows his eyes, then turns, his shoulder facing Steve’s chest. “They’re not my Avengers. You took them from me.” 

“You did that yourself.” 

Tony wants to laugh, and he wants to cry. 

“If he wakes up, you give him his options.” 

He leaves before he breaks.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there's gonna be plot and resolution eventually. maybe.


End file.
